7th Grade News

October 24, 2016 Newsletter

Hello Parents!

Student Lead Conferences are right around the corner! They will be held on Wednesday, November 9 from 3:00 p.m.-7:30 p.m., Thursday, November 10 from 4:00p.m.-7:00p.m and Friday, November 11 from 8:00 a.m.-12:30 p.m. A sign up sheet will come home with your child next week so look for it!

WREATH and POINSETTIA UPDATE:

All Wreath and Poinsettia orders and money are due by Wednesday, October 26th.

We need your help organizing the Wreaths and Poinsettias once they arrive. Please contact Lorri (This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. or 970.456.9958) to sign up and help us make this a quick and easy process!

Wreath and Poinsettia orders will be ready for pick-up outside CMS on Wednesday, November 16th. Plan to help your student pick up his/her orders beginning at 1:45pm.

NEEDED:Parents, Guardians, Grandparents, Community Members.With an active PTO at CRES and a busy Booster Club at RFHS, it's time Carbondale Middle School harnessed more of our amazing adult community energy! Please consider becoming active with a small group of devoted CMS community members to help fundraise, take pictures, plan events, write grants, volunteer, and more! Contact Lorri at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. or 970-456-9958.

Math Update from Mrs. KaufmannThe first quarter math grades are based on the Schoology-delivered end of module test. Exit tickets, quizzes, and topic tests are designed to give students feedback about their progress throughout a module, and to allow them to correct and learn from their mistakes. End of module assessments are given district-wide and reflect a student’s independent achievement of the module learning targets. During student led conferences, your student should share their paper-based topic tests and their end of module test in Schoology so you can understand their progress with these learning targets. They will also have a problem solving assignment to share with you. Please pay particular attention to the comments on the report card and the learner behaviors of ‘executive skills’ and ‘perseverance’, as these behaviors directly impact student achievement.Our second module, on integer operations, should progress more quickly. All classes will be working on integer addition and subtraction this week, moving into rational number (positive and negative fractions and decimals) addition and subtraction.This week’s homework will be Khan Academy, due Saturday, and classes A and B will also have a problem solving due on Friday.Homework help will continue on Tuesdays until the week of 10/31, when it will be switched to Mondays to accommodate the basketball practice schedule. I am available at lunch/recess and after school this week for help.Thank you,Amy Kaufmann

Science Update from Ms. RavenscraftScience students recently completed their Separation of Mixtures Unit. Please ask your student how they did on their end of unit assessment. Graded tests were returned to students last Monday. Students were then given two days (of in-class time) to complete remediation assignments and tests corrections for any learning targets upon which they did not score proficient. Students' were instructed to work on remediation assignments & test corrections for homework, if two days of in-class time would not be enough.

Several students used their time wisely and were able to boost their grades from not proficient to partially proficient or proficient. In order to earn advanced, students had to score proficient on all test learning targets and have completed the quarterly extension.

Unfortunately some students choose not to complete their remediation assignments and test corrections. If this was the case, your student retained their original test score.

Perseverance and ownership for ones choices are perhaps the most important habits students can display. Please discuss with your child the choices they made to work towards proficiency in science this quarter. Parents will have access to specific scores and detailed reflections at Student Lead Conferences (which you'll hear more about in upcoming weeks).

Second quarter, will begin with a mini-unit on the Claim, Evidence, Reasoning investigative technique, which is being prioritized within all RFSD secondary science classes. This mini unit will last approximately 2 weeks.

Upon completion of the mini unit, students will examine cell and molecular biology topics including; cells, photosynthesis & cellular respiration.

Please contact me with any questions. Thanks for your support.

ELD Update from Ms. De La SalaELD: We will be getting into Greek Mythology and completing a character analysis. We will continue with the Rewards program and learn 20 common prefixes. To reinforce the format of a character analysis, we will complete a Dictado.

ELA Update from Ms. BerryWe will be analyzing Greek Myths the next few weeks and analyzing character in order to prepare to write our own myth in the next few weeks. Remember to have your child read 30 minutes every night!

Social Studies Update from Mr. MartinezIn social studies we are already off and running with our new content. After the first quarter, the classwork and homework load will increase, as my expectations of the students rise. This means many formative grades are already going into Schoology for second quarter. It’ll be important to stay on top of assignments and due dates by using Schoology. Also, incorporate homework club into your student’s homework routine because it is a valuable resource to help get work completed.

The students are wrapping up their survey of the Indus River Valley Civilization by completing a validity assessment of each of the five theories surrounding the disappearance of this vast civilization. After ranking each theory based upon validity, we will tie everything together during a Socratic seminar. The Socratic seminar will be the first summative assessment of the second quarter.

Later this week, we will transition to the last river civilization of our unit Survive and Thrive. The unit culminates with an examination of Egypt focused around the achievements of Egypt and the essential question: “How did the Nile shape ancient Egypt?”